DATE: Monday, August 4, 1997                TAG: 9708040048

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B2   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: Correspondent Jane Harper researched and wrote this report. 

                                            LENGTH:   53 lines

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO...FORMER CO-ANCHOR CYNTHIA LIMA?

On Aug. 7, 1996, WVEC-TV co-anchor Cynthia Lima said good-bye to viewers of her evening newscast and headed to Hawaii with her new husband, a Navy captain who had just been promoted to rear admiral and assigned to duty there.

Cynthia Lima hasn't been in front of a television camera in almost a year and lives thousands of miles away from viewers in Norfolk. Yet she still gets recognized when she goes out in public.

That's because Lima - who reported the news for 12 years in Hampton Roads, home to the Navy - now lives in Hawaii, where many Navy men and women often are assigned after stints in Norfolk or Virginia Beach.

``I'll be out somewhere and I'll notice someone staring at me, and then they'll come up and ask, `Don't I know you from somewhere?' And I'll ask them if they lived in Hampton Roads and, if they did, what newscast did they watch - and then they remember.''

Lima gave up her journalism career when she moved with her husband, but she's not out of the communication business. Shortly after arriving in Hawaii, she started a consulting business, Capitol Communications Inc. The business is going ``fairly well,'' she said, although she isn't able to devote as much time to it as she would like.

``My husband travels a lot and I travel with him. So I'm not able to give it the time and attention that it needs.''

Lima said she chose not to try to continue her TV career in Hawaii because ``it's not the sort of market you break into easily.'' Most newscasters there are Hawaiian, and viewers are proud of that, she said.

``I never expected to stay in television forever. I was in the business for 20 years. I was 15 when I started working in my first newsroom.''

Also, women TV reporters often aren't as well received as they grow older, Lima said, and she pointed out that she will soon turn the ``ancient'' age of 36. But she hasn't totally given up on the idea of working in television again and said she would return for the right job.

For now, though, she's enjoying life as a Navy wife. She grew up an Army brat and is used to frequent moves. She and her husband hope to start a family soon, she said.

Lima said she misses Hampton Roads and her many friends and colleagues here and would like to move back some day.

``I lived there longer than I've ever lived anywhere. It's home to me.'' MEMO: Whatever Happened To. . . appears every Monday, and we welcome

your suggestions for people and subjects to update.

Dial INFOLINE at 640-5555 and press 7878 to leave a message for Jane

Harper. ILLUSTRATION: Cynthia Lima runs a consulting company, Capitol

Communications Inc., in Hawaii.

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